Feb 6th Sunday:
At 08:45 the home care nurse called to say she was coming shortly for a visit. We were ready when she got here. The dog was safely tucked away in a room while she came to take the drain out. Home care have certain safety stipulations and one is, that if you have a dog/pet that they be locked away while they visit, so no risk of getting bitten or scratched. They also keep their shoes on, WCB regulations, so they don’t accidentally step on a pin or puncture or cut themselves in any way. Also they want to know how many people are in the home when they visit. Anyways, she came and I pulled the dressing off while she got her dressing tray ready for the big event! 🙂
The drainage has been getting less and less each day, so for the last 24 hrs it has been about 15 cc’s only. Well under the Dr’s order of if the drainage is less than 24 cc’s in 24 hrs.. the drain can come out. 🙂 So with a cut of the suture holding it in place, and a pull, it was OUT. Now, all I have there is the breast incision (still has some green dye on it) and a small dressing in armpit where they took the lymph nodes out and where the drain was in. That fresh incision and drain site is covered with a small mepore dressing. I’ve asked M to take a picture of it so you can see what it looks like (I didn’t take a picture while the drain was in but I guess I should have).
I was hoping the feeling of a big lump under my arm would go away. I had thought the big Abdominal pad they had folded in place was what I was feeling, but it wasn’t. It’s numb under my arm still, and when my arm is down by my side, it’s numb under my arm too, so it’s 2 numb things touching each other (weird feeling, let me tell you) that I am feeling. There is something going on with my nerves in the area, because sometimes if I move my arm or shoulder a certain way, it’s like I get a burning electric shock in my shoulder/axilla area. It’s hard to explain, but I am hoping as healing starts now that the drain is out, that it will get better slowly. fingers crossed!
The next thing that is going to happen is that home care will call in a couple of days to see how things are looking, and if no signs of infection in surgical sites, then I’ll be officially discharged from the home care program. I see family Dr and Surgeon on Feb 10th and I’m expecting to get news of the rest of the lymph nodes taken out Feb 1st.
Still no word from the cancer agency, but I think they wait until the breast and axilla heal up (about 4 weeks I think surgeon said) before they start me on radiation. I expect I’ll need chemo, but I will have to talk to them and see what they suggest.